USAs invandringskris

Den just nu hetaste politiska frågan i USA handlar om hur man ska hantera den illegala massinvandring av barn som väller in över landets södra gräns. Företrädare för de båda partierna skyller på varandra. President Obama har i dagarna varit i Texas och såhär beskriver Dallas Morning News besöket:

”The immigration issue has caused the White House to stumble this week. In Dallas on Wednesday, Obama pressed for Republicans to work with him on the border crisis, and on Thursday in Austin, he sounded exasperated at his political foes. He noted that while some Republicans have urged him to initiate action to stem the flood of child migrants crossing the border, some GOP leaders are threatening to go to court to reverse executive orders they say go beyond the authority of the White House. “There are a number of Republicans, including a number in the Texas delegation, who are mad at me for taking these actions,” he said in an apparent reference to Sens. John Cornyn and Ted Cruz. “Now I don’t know which things they find most offensive — me helping to create jobs, or me raising wages, or me easing the student loan burdens or me making sure women can find out whether they’re getting paid the same as men for doing the same job,” he said. “The best thing you can say about this Congress, the Republicans in Congress and particularly the House of Representatives, is that so far they have not shut down the government or threatened to have America welch on our obligations and ruin our credit rating,” he said.

The Hill, en nyhetsservice fokuserad på kongressen, skriver om det politiska spelet i frågan:

Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) has led the effort in Congress to link high immigration flows to stagnant wages but many Republican lawmakers have not joined in because the business community wants more guest workers and visas for high-skilled employees. Despite the lack of concerted effort by GOP leaders in Washington to used immigration reform as a weapon against Democrats, the issue could hurt them among white working-class voters who are slipping away from Obama. Polling by Rasmussen, a GOP survey group, showed working and middle-class Americans oppose large expansions of immigration flows. People earning under $30,000 prefer a reduction in immigration by a 3-1 margin, according to the group’s data.A Pew Research poll showed that 69 percent of the public believes the federal government should restrict and control people coming to live in the United States more than it already does. The Senate-passed immigration reform bill, which all Democrats supported, would substantially increase legal immigration levels.

USAs gränser är i praktiken nästan omöjliga att övervaka. Det räcker med att titta på kartan för att förstå detta, När ekonomin nu ter sig ljusare i USA kommer fler att söka sig dit. Det finns arbetsgivare som önskar billig arbetskraft – och det finns andra arbetsgivare – t ex Bill Gates i New York Times härom dagen –  som kräver en invandringsreform som gör det lättare för högkvalificerade invandrare att få stanna och arbeta.

Gates m fl skrev såhär i NYT: We believe it borders on insanity to train intelligent and motivated people in our universities — often subsidizing their education — and then to deport them when they graduate. Many of these people, of course, want to return to their home country — and that’s fine. But for those who wish to stay and work in computer science or technology, fields badly in need of their services, let’s roll out the welcome mat.

Det kanske mest svårlösta men mest uppenbart orimliga problemet: det finns miljoner illegala invandrare som bott i USA mycket länge, som är väl etablerade och vars barn är amerikanska medborgare eftersom de fötts i USA. Att skapa en väg till medborgarskap för dessa är uppenbart högst rimligt, men hittills har det inte lyckats att lösa denna politiska knut. George W Bush försökte med hjälp av Ted Kennedy och John McCain och var nära att lyckas då det republikanska partiet revolterade och reformförslaget dog i kongressen.

Detta kommer sannolikt förbli ännu en av de många olösta politiska problemen i USA. Det kommer att debatteras, man kommer att skylla alla problem på motståndarpartiet men några lösningar skymtar inte på något av de problem som är kopplade till invandringen.